Beauty on the Backroads

Stories of grace for life's unexpected turns

city living

Saturday. City. Snippets.

The cafe was crowded, matching the city streets outside.

It’s been a while since the kids and I have hung out in the city on a Saturday. If I needed a visual for the word “bustling,” I had it. Everywhere, there were people. Quilters in town for a convention. Men, women and children on their way to a march. Visitors. Residents.

I’m never sure how to classify us. We don’t live in the city, but we’re regulars now, so much so that when someone asks me where the convention center is, I can answer without hesitation, and I know which streets are one way and in which direction. My heart beats in rhythm with the city.

But sometimes I’m still overwhelmed.

Like when we walk into a crowded cafe with no backup plan for an alternative. No tables were open for the three of us, but I spotted three vacant stools at the long hightop. We placed our orders and headed in that direction.

“Is anyone sitting here?” I asked the older couple sitting on the end. “No,” the woman replied, welcoming us. (A side note: I’m a total introvert and often hesitant to engage strangers. But sometimes I surprise even myself.)

“Are you going to the march?” the woman asked me before I’d had a chance to fill our cups with water. The question surprised me a little. It’s not the first thing I would ask a stranger but maybe it was a good one for the kind of day it was in the city.

“No,” I told her. “Not this time.”

—

Photo by Jerry Kiesewetter on Unsplash

I’m sitting at home now feeling guilty. We were in the city. We could have gone to the march, but in all honesty, I only remembered on Friday that it was happening. Most Saturday events are inaccessible to us because my husband works and has the van those days. He just happened to be away for the weekend, though, and we did have a vehicle.

But we’d made plans. Library. Lunch. A festival at the Science Factory. I asked the kids the night before if they would want to go to the march and both of them were not overly eager. Now I’m wondering if I’m a bad parent for not taking them. Am I an activist who backs up her words with inaction?

Scrolling through photos and social media posts, shame rolled over me. I should have been there. I should have made us go.

—

Our food arrived at the hightop table where my son had been babbling away about Minecraft and school to these two strangers who listened as patiently as any grandparent would. The woman confessed to me that neither of them could hear very well, which in their case was probably a blessing. My kids say the darnedest things in front of strangers, and I am secretly horrified every.single.time.

We didn’t learn much about them except the man is an artist with an exhibit at a nearby gallery, and they have family in the area. When they left, though, the woman said they had enjoyed the conversation, and I felt only gratitude. So much of what we do as humans these days is solitary or “social” in name only (I’m looking at you social media) that it was refreshing to choose connection in a crowded cafe.

Maybe this is its own kind of lesson.

—

We finished our lunch and walked up the street to market, where we’d usually find my husband. On the way, I noticed the number of people holding signs asking for help. This isn’t something we usually see because we’re often in the city in the early morning or toward the end of the work day. Once we were in the market, we waved to my husband’s coworkers and made a quick bathroom stop. The market, too, was crowded with people of all walks of life.

We left out a different door and circled the building.

“THERE’S NO WAY!”

A man was talking loudly with his group of friends and I heard the phrases “government assistance” and “food stamps” in his tirade. I can only assume he was decrying the people with signs asking for help.

His words hung with me, and I wondered how many times we use that thinking as a reason not to get involved, as a way of staying blind. If we can convince ourselves that a person in need is running a con then we absolve ourselves of responsibility. Right? How many times do I tell myself the story I want to hear so I don’t have to take action?

—

I have been reading a lot about racial injustice lately, and I am convinced that I am blind in more ways than I know. I am a white woman who can hardly see past the end of her privilege and it is wrecking me.

And waking me.

But I still have a long way to go.

I’m discovering that it’s easy to become myopic. I think this is a default mode for most of us. We can see what’s right in front of us pretty clearly, but to see farther away, we need some help. It takes some effort.

Photo by rawpixel.com on Unsplash

Myopia is not all bad. When I was working with refugees weekly, I was full of stories and passionately advocating for immigration policies that would benefit them. When government policies lessened the presence of refugees in our community, I shifted my gaze toward undocumented youth. Now I’m learning about racial injustice. Because I now spend my days with students, some of whom have harder stories than others, my vision has shifted again. I still care about all of these things, but I’m realizing that it takes conscious effort to see them in my daily life. Like putting on a pair of glasses.

I have to want to see.

—

Our first stop of the morning had been to the library where two of us picked up books we’d requested and all of us walked out with at least one book. While we were there, I overheard a woman complaining about not having a library card and needing to use the computer so she could complete some paperwork for a job she’d just gotten.

Later, when I heard the man loudly proclaiming “There’s no way,” I thought about the woman at the library. About the little (and not so little) lines that separate us. Access to Internet seems like it should be ubiquitous by now. (I could insert “secure housing” or “adequate food” or “a living wage” into that sentence, too.) But even in the United States, a country we like to believe is more well-off than other places in the world, these things are not guarantees for everyone.

But you have to want to see it if you’re ever going to believe it.

—

We parked our van on the rooftop level of the parking garage, which made my son’s day. He’s been begging us to park up there for months and when we first arrived, we were the only car on that level. It was creepy in a sort of post-apocalyptic kind of way. For a moment, we felt like the only people on earth.

When we left, a few other cars had joined us on the top level. The sound system for the post-march rally was being tested in the park next to the garage. Sounds of life were all around us. We knew we were not alone in the world.

I steered the car carefully on the ramp as we descended back to street level.

And this I think is the point of all of this: a vantage point offers us a spectacular view and maybe even a moment of peace, but to see the world true, we more often than not have to be on the same level as the people and circumstances we’re trying to understand.

For many of us, that means a descent to street level or the wearing of glasses to give us better vision.

I still have so much work to do.

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A work of heart

“Excuse me, ma’am.”

I was biting into an Indian veggie patty in the few minutes I had before picking up the van from the parking garage and heading to the kids’ school. I looked up to see a woman in front of the bench where I sat.

“Do you have some change so I can get something to eat?”

I swallowed my bite and didn’t think twice about the words that came out of my mouth.

“I’m sorry. I don’t have any change.”

The truth was that I had cash on me, which almost never happens. But because she asked for change, I took her request literally and didn’t have to lie. In that exact moment, I could have given her more than change. As she walked away, I felt it–guilt pricked my heart. I was tired and anxious and overwhelmed from helping others. These are the excuses I told myself.

I could have helped. I chose not to.

—

Nina Strehl via Unsplash

Two weeks ago, our neighbor suffered a heart attack and spent almost that entire time in the hospital. He is an older man and his wife doesn’t drive at all and they are the ones whose dogs bark at everything. We have been politely neighborly from a distance, but suddenly we were smack dab in the middle of their lives. The woman asked me to take her to their once-a-month food bank appointment, and I said yes. That day, I carried bags and boxes of food into their house, a place in which I had never set foot though we’ve lived next door for more than four years.

A few days later, when the husband was unexpectedly released from the hospital, our neighbor walked over and asked if I could take her to the pharmacy. Purse in hand, she was ready to go. The kids were off school and we were close to leaving for a family adventure, but she needed her husband’s medicine. I said yes. An hour later—longer than either of us expected—I was back at home and our family adventure was delayed but not postponed.

A few hours before the woman downtown asked me for change, my neighbor was on my doorstep asking if I could take the two of them to her husband’s doctor appointment in a couple of days. I hemmed and hawed and eventually said yes even though the whole thing is getting uncomfortable. The day they need a ride my husband needs to go to work, and they offered their vehicle, but now I am wondering how much is too much here. When she left I researched transportation options for low-income seniors. One reply to an e-mail gave me some hope that I would not have to bear this entire burden alone.

—

So, this was my state of mind when the woman asked me for change to get some food. Half a minute after she walked away, I realized my veggie patty was frozen in the middle and I would enjoy it more if I took it home and warmed it up. I pulled a dollar out of my bag when I realized the woman and her male companion had headed in the direction I needed to go. I wanted to apologize and give her the dollar, but she walked away from where I stood at the crosswalk waiting for the light to change. Maybe the sight of me and my purchased lunch disgusted her. Maybe she couldn’t handle another rejection. Maybe she didn’t even see me.

The man who was with her stood his ground on the sidewalk and spoke up.

“I don’t mean no disrespect,” he said, “but I’m just trying to get some food. Do you have anything that could help? I missed all the mission lunches today.”

Photo by NeONBRAND on Unsplash

I looked him in the eye and said, “I have a dollar. Would that help?” I handed it over.

His eyes brightened and he said, “I could get a slice of pizza. Thank you.”

“Enjoy your pizza,” I said. Later, I thought I should have asked him what he liked on his pizza because you can tell a lot about a person by what they put on their pizza. Maybe next time. I also should have given him more than a dollar. I had two more in my purse.

I crossed the street, still stewing a little, still tired from all the helping. I ran through my usual list of reasons why no one should be asking me for help.

We barely get by month to month ourselves.

We have one beat-up van we’re nursing along to 200,000 miles.

We don’t have extravagant things.

We are probably only one or two disasters from being out on the street ourselves. (I say this a bit dramatically, although many of us are closer than we think to being in a devastating circumstance.)

A group of men in suits walked by as the man and I were talking. “Ask them!” I wanted to say, but I rarely see the suits hand out money. If I was downtown every day, dressed for work, would I get tired of being asked? I’m already tired of being asked.

Maybe they ask me because I look like someone who says “yes.” Maybe that makes me an easy mark. Or maybe it’s the divine spark in them being drawn to the divine spark in me.

—

Don’t tell me my heart is in the right place. I know better than anyone that it isn’t. At least, not always.

Last month a woman asked my friend and me for help as we cut through the park on our way back to the car. She had a black eye (real or fake, I still don’t know) and a story about a boyfriend beating her up and taking her tip money. She needed help. She had nothing. We had just eaten a free lunch and learned about having productive conversations about race and injustice. We gave her money and then talked about whether we should have or not afterward. We are both Christian women who care deeply about social issues and justice. Still, we wondered if we had done the right thing. And maybe being together meant that we did what we would not have done if we were by ourselves.

Photo by Jamez Picard on Unsplash

This is how I know my heart is not always in the right place. I still second guess myself in doing the right thing. I want to punch my “doing good” time clock and be done for the day, the week, the month. I don’t want to be responsible for months of appointments especially not for people I barely know who aren’t refugees and aren’t the nicest of people.

Maybe giving money to someone is the wrong thing. But when I think of Jesus and his words about serving Him through serving the least, I think I’d rather be wrong, just in case Jesus is there. (Spoiler alert: I’m pretty sure He’s always there whether I see Him or not.)

—

I’m in the third week of teaching a course on spiritual practices at church. One of the traditions we’ll be looking at this week is “holiness,” which if I’m honest, sometimes leaves a bad taste in my mouth. But as I’m learning about the true nature of this tradition, that it isn’t legalism or rules or perfectionism, the more I understand how necessary it is.

Holiness is a work of the heart, an inner transformation that makes these outward actions of love not only possible but repeatable. Most of us can do the right thing one time. But what about the next time? Or the time after that?

Only a heart that has been oriented and re-oriented will point us in the right direction consistently. This is what I’m learning about holiness and its effect not only on me but on the world in which I live.

To seek a holy life is not to seek an otherness that separates. It is to seek a way of life that works for the betterment of others. Quaker mystic and spiritual disciplines author Richard Foster says “a holy life is a life that works.” Could anyone say that they don’t want their life to “work”?

My heart may not always be in the right place. But it is getting there. And that is the best I can hope for. When I fail to act because of a misplaced heart, I can reset the course and try again.

As many times as necessary.